Discussion

Richtree?

Has anyone been to a place called Richtree? We are supposed to go there tomorrow night. What did you think? We are living in Niagara now so I am not up on local restaurants in Toronto lately. Thank you!

I believe you're talking about what used to be known as Marche's, with its "open-market" set-up and is a chain (nothing wrong with that!). It's a crowd-pleaser, in that there's something for everyone. They give you a card upon entry and you can wander around the different food stations to order whatever you want -- salads, pastas, pizza, meats, sushi, seafood, soups, desserts (crepes to-order, ice cream, cakes and tarts), I'm probably missing a few...

Nothing particularly spectacular and it's hard to find anything really "different" available, but it's pretty good if you are going for a social outing because of the wide array of choices. The food is fine, but the focus is probably more on your company. I usually get something from the seafood station.

If you know which one you are going to...the one at the BCE place is the biggest, and has a nice casual atmosphere.

Richtree is, indeed, the Movenpick Marche sans Movenpick. The style is as described, but quality has declined from the Movenpick days and "service" is as poor as ever.

When it was Movenpick, the BCE Place location had much better food than the others and the desserts were sometimes spectacular. I don't know whether this is still true. I found the York Mills and College Park locations truly bad.

Marches used to have a "compulsary service charge". I learned that (1) the staff didn't get the money and (2) you could refuse to pay it. Again, I don't know whether this situation persists.

Note that there is, indeed, a Toronto restaurant called "Richlee's". (I've never been there.)

The service charge goes to the employees - the company doesn't keep it. If the company kept it, I wouldn't go there, but it is distributed daily to everyone who works.I have spoken to one of the Union people who clarified.Hope that helps.

That may be true, Kevinpatrick; but I would still take it off my bill. It's a BUFFET for gosh sakes, where YOU do all the work of wandering around the various stations waiting to be served. I am happy to leave $2-3 for the busboys as I do at a Vegas buffet. But I don't tip the cooks at high end restaurants, why should I here ? Nor do I tip busboys 15% or whatever !

If you tip your waiter at a hgih end restaurant - you are tipping the cook.

One thing people often don't realize if they haven't worked in a restaurant is that tips do not go only to the waitstaff. Hence, not leaving a tip means that the waiter loses money. "tip-out" is based on sales that a waiter does, not as a percentage of tips.

Just something to think about when you say you dont leave tips for cooks or bus boys.

I would concur that Richtree is overpriced for very average food even though it looks impressive. I had the rosti which was not even properly cooked! With drinks and all (even just juice) is more than I want to pay for brunch or whatever given the fantastic TO options we have. Just experienced Movenpick in Switzerland which was a decent chain so I guess the place must have been better when they ran it, which is why our friends wanted to take us there.

If that's true now, that's a huge improvement. I worked at the BCE Marche for a summer, then the Square One Marchelino for the following school year about 8 years ago, and while there may have been some kind of sketchy "profit-sharing" business tacked on, there was no "gratuity" added on at any time. The employees, especially in BCE Place, had for the most part been working there for YEARS with very little to say for it. Devoted people, although I'll never understand why. Topic: Definitely overpriced, but the burgers and most grill station items are very good. Ah, to be able to dip my fries in mayo like I did back then...